I’m an ink-stained notebook fiend, most of my pens get chewed like a rabid terrier, I write poems, post copious amounts of blog posts, churn out news reports, provide opinion pieces for several publications, proofread anything that crosses in front of my eyes, heck I even accuse non-readers of treachery against humans (spoiler: writers hate […]
writing
Posted inEquality, General, Media
Is psychology serving humanity?
By Suntosh Pillay Do we have the intellectual courage to ask what is “post” about “post-apartheid” South Africa? This question was, interestingly and perhaps not coincidently, raised at two separate conferences happening at the same time in Durban last year September. At the Steve Biko National Conference, Veli Mbhele raised this provocative and necessary question […]
Posted inEquality, News/Politics
Are we freeing our imagination for social good?
Growing up, visits to the public library were the highlight of my month. I would wake up bright-eyed and early on a Saturday morning and spend hours there, always indecisive about which books to take home. And there I’d be, safe and comfortable in this place of wonder and excitement and fantasy. You could hear […]
Posted inGeneral, Lifestyle, Media
Writing about not writing
It’s been almost five weeks since I last wrote a column for this blog. Buzzing on enthusiasm after my page initially went live, I wrote two columns in my first week and tracked the page hits with the same concern as I would my own pulse. The initial post-publishing glow lasted longer than I imagined. […]
Posted inGeneral
Bloody hear me! Tantrums and novels’ striking openings
“It was the afternoon of my eighty-first birthday, and I was in bed with my teenage gay lover when Ali announced the archbishop had come to see me.” So snorts the opening sentence to Anthony Burgess’s Earthly Powers – almost. Instead of “teenage gay lover” St Anthony uses the word catamite. The sentence […]
Posted inGeneral
Racists
“Jean-Louis Belavoix had stood up amid the applause that followed Bates’s exhibition, and had begun all at once to speak in a loud voice. ‘How absurd, Mr Bates!’ He called down. ‘Are we really to believe that men differ from each other simply because of the funny angle under their noses? Is that why the […]
Posted inGeneral
The glamourisation of the writer
By Shubnum Khan When I was young and easily influenced by the likes of Chicken Soup for the Soul and Dr Phil, I scratched a line in my Life Goal book: Publish a novel by 25. And while I even surprised myself when I did it, I think it proves that all my life I […]
Posted inLifestyle
So much writing, is anyone reading?
By Suntosh Pillay It started innocently enough. But then again, I should have known better. My parents always said don’t go into strange places with strange people. But I couldn’t resist. Before I knew it, I was knee-deep in the online jungle called Amazon. Special offers were popping up in every corner. Books that I’ve […]